Concerns about multiplayer cheating and roadmap

Theres already a lot of videos of people infinitly rerolling enchantments and infusions for perfect gear and using cheat trainers, I think save file manipulation is also a big issue to be fixed asap if you want a fair multiplayer experience.

I think while its still early you should change the way you handle save files and find ways to prevent cheating and do a clean wipe before you release the multiplayer because these issues are only going to get worse and the people who have been cheating will have a huge advantage if you release the multiplayer first.

If we only have these first three areas to explore i personally don’t think playing it as a group is what the game needs right now, plus the amount of balancing work that you will need to do if you open the arena pvp or invasions will be a lot.

I think one of the main reason souls games stay alive and are loved for so long is the multiplayer community, assisting players, dueling, bosses, invasions. All of this needs to be fair and it needs to be sorted before you release it and it’s important to get this right.

Personally I think the main focus should be releasing the new areas and continuing the story and content whilst the multiplayer is made sure to be fair and performance/QoL is optimized.

Hopefully you already know this issue, nobody wants an unfair multiplayer game and the way this game is going i think this is going to be one of my favourite games of all time and this is my only concern, in all other aspects i think your hard work has paid off and your vision is perfect and you should stick to it, if you try to please too many people you’ll end up pleasing nobody, not even yourself.

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While I do hope they address cheating, I do not want a hard wipe. I am over 140 hours into my characters. I would be mad as hell if a hard wipe happens. I am pretty positive I am not alone in this.

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If a wipe means people wont have infinite OP weapons and armor etc in PvP then it’s probably for the best imo, I can’t see any other good way around it.

I disagree. Wiping disrespects all the time people put into the characters. I am sure some people will always find a way to cheat. However, penalizing everyone because of the few is not a good solution. I know I would not put all the 140 hours back into the game and definitely not recommend it if the devs hard wipe us.

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while i do agree, a wipe is frustrating for all of us, who farmed for specific rare gear for hours, i also am aware, that in a game that introduces multiplayer, a wipe might just be unavoidable.

right now people are using various exploits to get gear. changing computer time, duplicating with savefiles etc.

and as much as i want to keep my shit, i also do not want to be invaded by players who use all exploits, while i get my stuff the intended way, without “cheating”.

in such early stages, wipes are to be expected. i wish i could keep my stuff, but i highly doubt multiplayer will be fair, if these exploits are not fixed and the “illegally” obtained items are not removed.

i just hope there won’t be too many wipes. 1 major wipe when exploits are fixed, and multiplayer is introduced should be it. i really would be frustrated if another wipe when releasing version 1.0 would clear all my progress again.

and then again, i am almost certain it will happen, since fairness should always be the basic of any multiplayer.

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I play a lot of EA games and not one, including after adding multiplayer, wiped characters. Again everyone can find a way to cheat if they really want to. Destroying other people’s work is not a solution to that problem.

well, a lot of games wiped servers when they went from EA to full release. while i do know some don’t i also stopped playing games that didn’t when there were too many cheaters.

and u just find it plain unfair, if people are “allowed” to use exploits without consequences.

in this case these consequences sadly apply to us fair players as well. but i really do not want to play against or with people, who just took the easy route.

and so far, we do not know what will happen, so it is all speculation anyways.

I do understand not wanting to play with cheaters, I agree. However, I am sure Moon Studios has ways to find out who cheated and nerf those player’s accounts/games and not destroy the work of everyone else who played fair and by the rule. I personally have not seen any game that reset at the end of EA. I am glad I have not experienced that. They could also work around that by having Legacy characters or something like that. That way we do not have all our work gone done the drain. That would be way more than just frustrating.

I’m way too much of a “it’s about the journey not the destination” type guy to care about wipes even in a grindfest genre like ARPGs. IDK this game will change so much by 1.0 including the 1.0 update that it’s like whatever I get to experience it fresh like a newborn babe if they do wipe which personal opinion is that they should just so current players can’t ruin the experience for friends as well because so many gamers are sucky friends

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Well as I have stated I do understand about cheaters and agree. However, I also believe that the journey that we have been on (people who do not cheat) should not be penalized because of other’s exploits. In every game people constantly find ways to exploit the game. As I suggested, there are definitely ways to address this without a hard wipe.

All this talk about wipes while I stare at 400hrs and have no interest in PvP. Co-op for sure.

But…here’s an easy solution for both. No wipe + PvP balance without cheaters capable of ruining it.

Now bear with me, I’m no PvP expert but I think this would sound okay for me too.

-No Enchanted Armor/Weapons for PvP. It should be about the player and the weapon/rune choices. Not the fight against RNG systems. This way Devs need only focus on the Weapons and Runes.
-Choose a mainhand, an offhand and the runes to fit into them. Armor choice plays no role and the “weight limit” is decided at the start of the match for both players. Both players receive the same weights and defense regardless of armor chosen. FIGHT!

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Thank you for your time and expressing your concerns. This is a great topic for discussion!

We need a fair multiplayer game, on that I agree with you completely. What i do not agree with, is on what level the games fairness is supposed to be enforced.

I agree, that active cheating through mechanics, GodModes, OneHitK.O.s, AimAssists, you name it, shouldn’t have a place in serious Multiplayer Action. Those are also somewhat easy to manage (as people can usually feel the effect directly).

The enforcment of cheatproof multiplayer economy on the other hand, directly correlates with time investment and thus does not respect the time of the players. It promotes player retention through busywork over player retention through - imo much preferable - replayability (e.g. through roguelike elements like the crucible or seasonal characters/activities), fun new content or Meta shakeups, through interesting balancing.

Imo economy should NOT conflict with Multiplayer balance and it really does not have to. Correct me if I’m wrong, but from the top of my head, I can’t think of a Soulslike within which it does.

Here are two viable, somewhat simple solutions from my pov:

Accessibility of “optimal” Tools

One solution is, to make optimal tools somewhat readily accessable in the Endgame.

Take Elden Ring - Its somewhat easy (or rather straightforward :upside_down_face:) to have “the best” build, this way PvP economy is balanced. Play through the game two times and you can powerstance anything you want.

This can optionally be applied to upgrade materials or levels of gear at any level not just the endgame. What tools are available at any given point and how can they be used?

Take the Economy out of PvP

Another solution (albeit a less fun one), is to streamline PvP in a way, that takes economy out of the equation - One simple solution would be to disable all Item Enchantments, when engaging with PvP and limit the amount of consumables you can carry (if any).

My preferred Mix

  • Minorly restrict, what people can bring to designated PvP zones.
  • Exclude people that use GodModes, OneHit K.O.s and other cheat mechanics from PvP or separate them from the others. I think they already plan on doing exactly that.
  • Make PvP tools and optimal gear somewhat accessible in the Endgame. I am not talking about instant access to everything, but the ability to get to a single endgame build ready quickly enough, that it can be expected for Multiplayer balance purposes.
    / Optionally do this at different breakpoints in the game, if you want to ensure fairness throughout the games progression

Fair, respectful of the players time. no wipes necessary.

Edit: Also relatively easy to maintain in comparison.

Thank you for your time :pray:

the problem are not people using cheat engines (wall hacks, god mode etc.) the problem are people who use exploits to get better gear without actually putting in the time and effort. then they use more exploits to duplicate their items.

and imo it does not work to create multiplayer where only item XY is allowed. take invasions like in dark souls for example. this would then not be possible, or the invader would land in the others realm naked.
i rarely do pvp in souls likes, but when i do, i want to use my fully upgraded gear. i do not want to fight with a wooden stick against a wooden stick. thats boring as shit.

and dark souls pvp does have issues with items that got duplicated or obtained by cheats, but they use some sort o0f anti cheat, which just bans you once you get online with a item you obtained by cheating.
their cheat protection somehow recognizes by the item number/code, that it has been given by cheat engine.

But that also does not apply here, since these exploits are currently just abused game mechanics. no actual “cheats”.

I think there is no way to distinguish between items that have been legally farmed and items that have ben bought from finley by re-setting your PC time over and over. get what i mean?

and this also makes it impossible to “take the economy out of multiplayer balancing”. you can not separate those two when for example farming for silver is the only way to upgrade your weapon. again, i do not want to do pvp with a wooden stick on lvl 1.

the dark souls games have always been nerfed and buffed around multiplayer and invasions. and some bugs they fixed with bosses etc, they mostly fixed, so people had the same chances to get gear/areas/levels etc. with pvp in mind.

and souls pvp is working still even now is because it is balanced around areas and levels. when you have a lvl 99 character but you invade in the 2nd area of the game where a lvl 15 player is, your level and your weapon upgrade lvl will be reduced. something like that…
that is imo the only way to balance things in a game with different builts and random gear. as soon as u join pvp you are all virtually leveled down to the lowest player.

but even then, the weapon obtained by exploits is still not paid for with as much sweat and tears as the other players weapon. and the only way to mitigate that might just be fixing all exploits and wiping everything.

Well, I for one do not want people to be invading my realm like in souls games… that has always been a factor of the game I did not care for at all. I hope to not see that in this game. If there is PVP it would make sense to have it be in some kind of PVP arena in which they could control how pvp operates from the rest of the game. This would help make it possible to not have wipes. I will say again, and I am sure I am definitely not alone, if they hard wipe us that will make a lot of people who paid a fair price for this game very angry after putting in all the time we have. That will cause a review bomb for certain as well.

Although I’m sure they exist, I can’t recall an early access title that hasn’t wiped characters at some point, or at least required players to start a new game to experience content added later in the development process. Wipes, even repeated wipes, should always be expected during an early access period, and if it doesn’t happen then be pleasantly surprised. Treating it like a finished game prior to 1.0 is just begging for disappointment, though.

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I disagree. None of my early access titles wiped data, not a single one. There are definitely ways to address this and respect player’s time. I definitely hope they do not hard reset as that would make me not want to restart from scratch after all the hours I put into the game.

Like I said, I’m sure examples exist (you’ve obviously played some), but Early Access games like V Rising, Baldur’s Gate 3, Divinity Original Sin and DOS2, PaxDei, Astroneer, My Time at Portia, Raft… I can’t remember them all… have all had wipes during Early Access.

And, to be clear, I am talking about Steam Early Access, and not games that give you a few days headstart on launch as part of a pre-order bonus. That is an entirely different kind of early access (and those don’t wipe obviously).

Sometimes it’s just a case of older save files not being compatible with changes made, changes to the map that can’t be experienced without starting a new game, etc. It’s not always a case of trying to make things “fair”, it’s just sometimes a necessity.

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Well, I sincerely hope that does not happen. I definitely won’t start fresh and I do honestly believe it will piss a lot of people off if they do that.

The time it takes to get what you need in this game, especially due to all the RNG within the RNG is insane and it would be devastating to have all that wiped. Not to mention all the time mechanics gating everything into taking longer to complete as well.

I’m pretty sure one of the devs already said about when they relased 2 months ago they are going to wipe at some point on twitter, this is only a very small part of the game we have to play right now so you have to be prepared for that in the future updates.